Summary

Dakara was a planet of extensive history that started at the time of the Ancients millions of years ago. It later became of significance to the Goa'uld as a symbol of their godhood among their Jaffa because the first prim'ta (infant Goa'uld symbiote) implantation ceremony was performed there. It was in control of the Free Jaffa Nation when it was destroyed by the Ori.

Factoids

Names and Designations: Dakara

Number of Suns: 1

Number of Moons: 1

Source of Address: Rebel Jaffa

Introduced in Episode: 8.16 "Reckoning Part 1"

Earth Cultural/Technological Equivalent: None

Main Interest: Ancient Weapon; Temple

Influenced/Dominated by: Ancients; Goa'uld; Free Jaffa Nation

History of Stargate: Unknown

Stargate Glyphs

Unknown

Geopolitical Structure and History

Dakara of the Ancients

The Ancients once lived on Dakara. As a matter of fact, this planet is believed to be their first landing place in the Milky Way after they traveled for thousands of years in their spaceship. They had left their home galaxy because their brethren, a group known as the Ori, had just raised an army to destroy them for their opposing philosophical view. These persecuted people were known as the Altera those many millions of years ago, but after making the Milky Way their new home, which they called "Avalon", they became known as the Ancients. After settling in the Milky Way, they began building their Stargates, which they called "Astria Porta". This device was invented by an Alteran man named Amelius, the inspiration for which came on the eve of his people's exodus. (8.17 "Reckoning Part 2", 9.02 "Avalon Part 2", 9.10 "The Fourth Horseman Part 1", Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

The Ancients built a massive monument, which appeared to be in the form of a sitting man wearing a helmet with a long veil attached to it and robes which covered his entire body, yet his arms and legs are visible, and which housed a powerful weapon. When activated, this weapon opened like a four-petaled flower from the statue's head. (8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

After the Ancients were nearly wiped out by a plague which swept through the galaxy millions of years ago (between five and ten million years ago), the Ancients used this device to reseed life in the Milky Way Galaxy. If the device were originally built for that purpose, then it wouldn't necessarily have been seen as a weapon. However, because the device emits an energy wave which could very well wipe out life just as easily as create it, whoever possessed it could hold that very fact over millions in a demonstration of power. (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1", 8.17 "Reckoning Part 2", 8.18 "Threads", Stargate Atlantis: 1.01 "Rising Part 1")

The Ancients protected the weapon with a combination lock on a large stone wall which covered the entrance to the device's control center. Anyone who could read the oldest form of the Ancients' language could determine that combination with great ease. Remarkably, upon its modern-day discovery, the weapon seemed to have remained dormant ever since it was used by the Ancients those millions of years ago. (8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

Which group of Ancients actually used the weapon to seed the Milky Way with new life is still unknown, since there were only three groups known to exist in the galaxy in that time:

The Ancients who learned how to ascend to a higher plane of existence and join "The Others" who also lived in that state. (6.22 "Full Circle")

Those who left Earth for the Pegasus Galaxy in the city-ship called "Atlantis". (Stargate Atlantis: 1.01 "Rising Part 1")

Those who couldn't ascend, but eventually died out (from the plague and its effects). (6.22 "Full Circle")

Because the human lifeform is said to have originated from Earth in the Milky Way, it is possible that the Ancients emitted the wave through the Stargate on Dakara with only Earth as its destination. What became of the Ancients who reseeded life in the galaxy is not known. (1.03 "The Enemy Within", "8.17 "Reckoning Part 2", 8.18 "Threads")

Dakara of the Goa'uld

Eventually Dakara was discovered by the Goa'uld. It was said that Anubis was one of the oldest System Lords and his first resurrection occurred on Dakara. This might have been the first time a sarcophagus was used, or might indicate the first time that the Anubis symbiote took a different host. (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1")

The first prim'ta implantation ceremony was conducted in the temple on Dakara. This ceremony is when a Jaffa's abdominal pouch is created and a Goa'uld symbiote is placed inside of it to mature. The Jaffa were genetically engineered to increase the odds that a symbiote would survive long enough to eventually be blended into its host. Before that, the odds were a one in two chance of successful blending. (1.02 "Children of the Gods Part 2", 6.10 "Cure")

Because of the natural healing powers of the symbiote, the Jaffa is given long life and good health. Most of the male Jaffa were trained as the Goa'uld's soldiers, while the rest of the Jaffa population served in temples and did other tasks which supported the status of the Goa'uld as a god. (1.02 "Children of the Gods Part 2")

The Goa'uld's status as gods to the Jaffa was established on Dakara because of this first implantation ceremony. Because of this, it was important that the planet remain under the control of the Goa'uld. The last Goa'uld known to have Dakara within his territory was Ba'al. He kept several ha'tak in orbit to protect the planet which was deep within his territory. How and when he obtained the planet remains a mystery. (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1")

The Battle Over Dakara

Replicator ship lands in courtyard

Inscribed wall with Ancient writings and combination lock

Carter and Jacob/Selmak find weapon's control room

When the Replicators came to the Milky Way Galaxy, their first order of business was to wipe out the Goa'uld and take their technology. The Replicators were led by the human form duplicate of Samantha Carter. They immediately attacked and killed the last remaining System Lords who sat on the Goa'uld System Lords' High Council. They then began spreading throughout the galaxy, attacking and taking control of every ha'tak they encountered. Anubis and Ba'al sent a great mass of their fleets to fight the Replicators, but the battle was extremely one-sided because the Replicators were relentless. Ba'al called them "a scourge". (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1")

The Rebel Jaffa saw the opportunity to forever discredit the Goa'uld as gods when Ba'al sent some of the ha'tak which normally guarded Dakara to fight the Replicators, leaving the planet open to attack. They took control of the temple with hardly a fight because they had greater numbers. The battle to keep Dakara, on the other hand, was the greater challenge. (6.16 "Reckoning Part 1")

Ba'al worked under Anubis in their fight against the Replicators, but when he found out that Anubis planned to use the powerful weapon hidden on the planet, he decided to ask for the Tau'ri's help. Amazing as it seemed, he kept them informed of what Anubis was doing and asked for help in ridding them of the Replicators because he knew that the Tau'ri had helped the Asgard several times in the past. He also decided to stall his fleet's arrival to Dakara, even though the Rebel Jaffa had taken control of the temple there. This stalling tactic was to give the Tau'ri time to find and destroy the weapon. (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1", 8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

Jacob/Selmak discover weapon's function

Replicators infiltrate the temple

Jacob/Selmak push the button

Once Lt. Col. Samantha Carter and Jacob Carter/Selmak opened the entrance to the control room of the Ancient weapon, they were prepared to destroy it using a naquadah reactor. But Jacob/Selmak discovered that the weapon's technology was capable of emitting an energy wave set on a frequency which would only destroy the Replicators and leave other living things alone. They decided not to destroy the weapon, but to calibrate it to within a margin of the modified frequency used by the disruptor gun designed by Jack when he held the knowledge of the Ancients from his second download of the database from a Repository of Knowledge. Thor of the Asgard connected Jack to his computer system on his ship, the Daniel Jackson, and Jack used his Ancient knowledge and Thor's computer to design this disruptor gun. The weapon on Dakara used similar technology because both were of Ancient design. (8.02 "New Order Part 2", 8.16 "Reckoning Part 1", 8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

The Replicators were connected to each other through a subspace link. Because of this link, if a group of them were destroyed by the disruptor wave, the remaining group could develop a cipher to become immune to the wave. In order to wipe out all of the Replicators throughout the galaxy, the wave needed to be translated through every Stargate in the galaxy at the same time. Carter asked Ba'al to reprogram the DHD and Stargate on Dakara to dial all the other Stargates because he had done something similar with a virus which had originally been planted by the SGC to knock out one of his Stargates. Ba'al performed the modification by showing Carter how to do it while he projected his image in a hologram from his command ha'tak which was in orbit over Dakara. (8.16 "Reckoning Part 1", 8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

Ba'al began to help the Carters to set the console panels to match the output frequency of the disruptor gun, but had to leave when his ship lost life support on several levels. The Replicators were there, too, having heard about the weapon on Dakara from a probe of Daniel Jackson's subconscious mind after he was captured by Replicator Carter. She had hoped that he might hold Ancient knowledge from his time ascended, and, as it turns out, she found that he not only had information about Dakara, but also held all of the Ancients' knowledge. She was distracted by her greed and Daniel took advantage of the knowledge she was unburying and the distribution commands she was sending to her "brethren" (the bug-like first generation Replicators) to take control of all of the Replicators. He froze their progress and prevented Replicator Carter from issuing a counter-command long enough for the Carters to calibrate the weapon. Those few seconds of control helped to save the entire galaxy from the Replicators' destruction. As soon as she could, Replicator Carter killed Daniel, but it was too late for her because by that time, Jacob/Selmak matched the frequency and hit the button on the weapon. All Replicators throughout the galaxy were destroyed. (8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

The Rebel Jaffa boarded Ba'al's ha'tak and attempted to gain his surrender, but he beamed out of the ship to some unknown location. Ba'al's escape left his fleet and Dakara in control of the Rebel Jaffa. (8.17 "Reckoning Part 2")

Dakara of the Free Jaffa Nation

Teal'c and Bra'tac become brothers to all Jaffa

Jaffa fill courtyard to honor Bra'tac and Teal'c

Jaffa occupy the ruins of Dakara

The Rebel Jaffa landed several of their ha'tak on the planet and kept the others in orbit. They used the temple as a ceremonial place once more. This time, the ceremony was to honor Master Bra'tac and Teal'c for their leadership in realizing the Jaffa's freedom. One of the high priests, Tolok, performed the ceremony, much like a knight's tapping ceremony where he used a staff weapon instead of a sword, and declared that Bra'tac of Chulak and Teal'c of the Tau'ri were blood brothers to all Jaffa. Everyone in attendance bowed before them, but Bra'tac announced that from that moment on, no Jaffa would bow down to anyone. Bra'tac and Teal'c then stepped out of the temple to see a mass of Jaffa assembled in the courtyard between the temple and the Stargate. It was their day, one for which they had fought for so long. (8.18 "Threads")

The high priests suggested that Bra'tac and Teal'c take seats on a High Council in order to establish a new nation. It was important that they learn to become a nation of diverse peoples quickly or else their freedom could be replaced by anarchy. (8.18 "Threads")

The first challenge presented to the new nation was the dispensation of the powerful Ancient weapon. Some believed that it should be kept available in case it would be needed again; while others felt that it needed to be destroyed. If the Free Jaffa kept the weapon, it would have given them the leverage they needed and have instilled fear among the rest of the galaxy. But, an operational weapon could become the object of those seeking ultimate power. This was the case when Anubis devised a plan to take the weapon from the Rebel Jaffa. His plan included dividing their forces by sending false intelligence that all of the Kull Warriors were assembling on Tartarus and would be on their way to Dakara to annihilate the entire population of Rebel Jaffa. In order to stop this invasion, the Rebel Jaffa sent a portion of their fleet to Tartarus and left a portion to guard the weapon. The Kull Warriors weren't at Tartarus, but had already arrived on Dakara to wipe out whoever remained there. The Rebel Jaffa fleet at Tartarus were too far away to offer any kind of assistance. (8.18 "Threads")

Anubis was posed to push the button to end all life in the galaxy when he suddenly disappeared. No one was aware that Oma Desala had engaged Anubis in an eternal struggle in the ascended plane to prevent him from taking action. She did this as recompense for having broken the first rule of the ascended and helping Anubis ascend when he had gone to Kheb over a thousand years ago. Afterwards, all of the Kull Warriors became confused and the Rebel Jaffa quickly overcame them and retook control of the weapon. Because of this close call, the High Council agreed to destroy the weapon and build a new monument where the old one once stood. (8.18 "Threads")

The Fall of Dakara

Various restored buildings and Stargate on Dakara before destruction

Ori warship blasts Dakara from space

Gen. Landry and Bra'tac witness Dakara's destruction before escaping through the Stargate

As it turned out, the Free Jaffa's High Council didn't destroy the weapon as they had first proposed. Most probably, the turmoil of defining the new nation's government placed the decision to destroy the weapon on hold. Eventually, an agreement was arranged that the weapon would not be used by the Free Jaffa, but it was not destroyed. This kept the monument intact and the Free Jaffa began restoration projects to bring back the glory of the Ancients' architecture. Dakara became the governmental center of the Free Jaffa Nation. (9.01 "Avalon Part 1", 9.02 "Avalon Part 2", 10.07 "Counterstrike")

When the Ascended Beings known as the Ori found out about Earth and the Milky Way Galaxy, they began sending their missionaries, called Priors, to various planets through the Stargates throughout the galaxy in an attempt to convert the populations into worshippers. It was discovered that the Ori were somehow empowered by the surrender of a worshipper's free will. With the bounty of potential converts found in the Milky Way, the Ori began a forceful campaign to convert as many as they could in as short a time as possible. Priors visited Free Jaffa planets, knowing that the Jaffa were bred into slavery to the Goa'uld, but underestimating their resolve. Several Jaffa strongholds were destroyed because the Jaffa vowed to serve false gods no more. (9.06 "Beachhead", 9.08 "Babylon")

But this resolve was not universal among the Jaffa. There were many who sought the Path to Enlightenment which is promised in the Ori's The Book of Origin. For thousands of years, the Jaffa have sought Kheb and the next stage of life after death through ascension. The Free Jaffa's new leader, Gerak, was one who long sought the Path, and he was easily converted to Origin. Using his position of power, he attempted to make it the law that all Jaffa would worship the Ori, but he was opposed by those who supported the right to choose and democracy. Even after Gerak was converted into a Prior himself, he realized that he was taking the wrong path for his people. He sacrificed his life in order to save the Tau'ri who had been stricken with the Prior Plague, declaring that he would die free as all Free Jaffa hope to do. (9.10 "The Fourth Horseman Part 1", 9.11 "The Fourth Horseman Part 2")

The Ori took Chulak and at least two more Jaffa strongholds before the new leader of the Free Jaffa, Se'tak, took desperate action. All around him, his people were dying and their current level of technology was not effective against the Ori's massive warships. His small Council decided to use the weapon against a planet known to be where an Ori warship had landed. They evacuated the majority of the Dakara population and used the weapon's energy wave through their Stargate to this planet. They killed thousands of humans in the matter of a few seconds. SG-1 was on the same planet when the wave struck, escaping in the nick of time because the Odyssey beamed them out when the wave was first detected. (10.01 "Flesh and Blood Part 1", 10.02 "Morpheus", 10.07 "Counterstrike")

Bra'tac was still on the High Council when Se'tak decided to use the weapon. The more he spoke against it, the more he alienated both himself and his cause. Bra'tac went to Stargate Command to ask for help, but by then, the weapon had already been used. General Landry went back to Dakara with Bra'tac in an attempt to talk Se'tak out of continued use of the weapon, but Se'tak's suspicious nature and disdain for the Tau'ri prevented him from making any headway. Se'tak's intelligence reports that SG-1 was on the Ori warship with his own patrols made him even more paranoid. When the Ori warship took off and destroyed three of the Jaffa's ha'tak in the planet's orbit, Se'tak had Landry and Bra'tac placed under guard. When he realized that the Ori warship had arrived at Dakara, Se'tak decided to use the weapon once more against it because he believed that the Tau'ri were there to destroy the weapon. The last wave from the weapon killed his own Jaffa patrols who were onboard the warship, but SG-1 was successfully beamed out by the Odyssey once again after Col. Emerson followed them there on a hunch that they were still onboard the warship when it unexpectedly took flight. (10.07 "Counterstrike")

The Ori warship was actually being flown by Adria, the Orici. She had great mental powers, as well as a personal shield which saved her from the deadly waves. After the wave hit her ship over Dakara, she opened fire on the weapon and the remainder of the planet. Se'tak and his men died inside the weapon's control room in a desperate attempt to fire it once more. Bra'tac and Landry escaped through the unguarded Stargate as Dakara fell. (10.07 "Counterstrike")

Adria destroyed Dakara completely and the Stargate was buried in the rubble. A scout was sent in a cargo ship to survey the damage — there were no suvivors. Bra'tac and Teal'c both mourned the loss of Dakara because its destruction pretty much guaranteed that the Free Jaffa Nation was no more. (10.07 "Counterstrike")

The Ruins of Dakara

SG-1 are assaulted by Ori fighters in the ruins of Dakara

Daniel and his artifact are surrounded by Ori soldiers in the ruins of Dakara

Tomin looks on in awe at the dead Prior in the ruins of Dakara

While the Jaffa had been rebuilding, they had found and logged many Ancient artifacts, but were mostly occupied with the war against the Ori. After their capital city was destroyed and the Stargate buried, no one inhabited the planet. But, close to a year after the city's destruction, SG-1 returned to Dakara searching for an artifact that Daniel thought was buried there by the Ancients when they first arrived in the Milky Way. This device was an advanced brain-washing machine that would reveal the truth that the Ori were not gods. The team hoped to use this device on the Priors who led the Ori's crusade in the galaxy. (Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

Since Daniel had once harbored the consciousness of the Ancient Merlin, he thought that the visions he was having about this artifact, called the Ark of Truth, was a residual of that time. Daniel interpreted one portion of the visions, images of an exploding mountain, to be of Dakara when the weapon was destroyed by Adria. (Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

As soon as the team found a large chest in the ruins, they were attacked by Ori fighters and soldiers. Eventually, the team was surrounded, and they surrendered, hoping to get the Ori soldiers to open the sealed chest. The Prior leading the group commanded that his soldiers open the chest, but much to the team's dismay, it proved to be an ordinary storage container for old parchments and not the device they were actually looking for. (Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

The Prior commanded that SG-1 be killed, but the military leader of the soldiers, Tomin, countered the order because he had promised that the team would not be harmed if they surrendered peacefully. Tomin's refusal angered the Prior, who tried to grab Tomin's staff weapon and begin the executions himself. Mitchell quickly grabbed a staff weapon from a nearby soldier and killed the Prior with one blast to the chest. Surprised by the Prior's death, the soldiers surrendered to SG-1 once they realized that the Prior's supposedly god-given powers could be neutralized by ordinary humans with the use of the Anti-Prior Device. (Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

Eventually, this meeting with Tomin was what helped lead Daniel to the location of the real Ark in the Ancients' original home galaxy. Tomin was familiar with the Ori's holy scripture, called The Book of Origin, and he gave Daniel a new interpretation of his visions, which were later revealed to have been given to Daniel by the Ascended Ancient Morgan Le Fay who was covertly helping the team locate and use the Ark. The actual exploding mountain in Daniel's vision and the resting place for the Ark of Truth was the original mountaintop home of the Altera that the Ori called "Ortus Mallum", the "birthplace of evil". The mountain exploded when the Altera burst their starship through the mountaintop from an underground hangar and engaged the ship's powerful engines to begin their journey to find a new home. (Stargate: The Ark of Truth)

Alternate Dakaras

Alternate Reality: 9.13 "Ripple Effect"

According to Samantha Carter of the alternate SG-1 that caused teams from several alternate realities to converge in this universe, the Ori established a second beachhead and destroyed Chulak, Dakara, and most of the Jaffa strongholds (9.13 "Ripple Effect"). Since she and her team were lying about several things to hide their culpability in creating the rupture in space-time, it is uncertain whether her information was accurate. However, the team was desperate to even take such action, so it is likely her intelligence on the Ori's efforts were true.

Dakara Weapons Puzzle

Dakara Weapons Puzzle screen in Prometheus video game

The Dakara Weapons Puzzle was a part of the Prometheus online video game built by the Stargate Program to find mathematically talented individuals who could solve the formula for directing energy from a planet's core to power up the Stargate for long distance connections using the ninth chevron. In the case of the Puzzle, energy was to be drawn from a planet's core to power a weapon most likely similar to the actual Dakara Weapon—thus, the name. (Stargate Universe: 1.01 "Air Part 1")

This formula was the last thing that the Icarus Project needed to successfully power the Stargate, and a 25-year-old MIT drop-out named Eli Wallace was the first to solve the Puzzle. He was immediately recruited by Lt. Gen. Jack O'Neill of Homeworld Command and Dr. Nicholas Rush, the leading scientist of the Icarus Project, who had programmed the Puzzle, but was unable to solve the problem himself. (Stargate Universe: 1.01 "Air Part 1")

The idea of creating the Puzzle came from Chloe Armstrong, the daughter and aide to Senator Alan Armstrong of California, who was in charge of the funding for the Icarus Project. Because Dr. Rush had not been successful in devising a formula to safely draw power from a highly unstable, yet extremely powerful, naquadria core, it looked like the $1.6 billion spent by US taxpayers was about to be wasted. Chloe's idea and Eli's solution saved the Project, and more importantly, they were successful in dialing a nine-chevron address to the Ancients' long-abandoned vessel Destiny before the Icarus Base was lost during a battle. (Stargate Universe: 1.01 "Air Part 1", 1.02 "Air Part 2")

Dakara wasn't the only name borrowed from the Stargate Program to go into the video game. Prometheus was also the name of the first space battlecruiser built using materials and technology found through the Stargate. That ship, unfortunately, was lost in battle after about three years of service. (6.11 "Prometheus", 9.15 "Ethon")